New York (AP) — Gov. Eliot Spitzer, the crusading politician who built his career on rooting out corruption, apologized Monday after allegations surfaced that he paid thousands of dollars for a high-end call girl. He did not elaborate on the scandal, which drew calls for his resignation.

At a hastily called news conference, Spitzer stood next to his stone-faced wife and bit his lips, telling reporters: "I have acted in a way that violates my obligations to my family."

"I have disappointed and failed to live up to the standard I expected of myself," he said. "I must now dedicate some time to regain the trust of my family."

As he walked out, reporters shouted: "Will you resign?" He did not answer.

New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer holds a news conference Monday in New York City with his wife Silda by his side after it was announced that he has been involved in a prostitution ring. (TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP/Getty Images)

The New York Democrat's involvement in the ring was caught on a federal wiretap as part of an investigation opened in recent months, according to a law enforcement official who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing inquiry.

Four people allegedly connected to the ring, identified in court papers as the Emperors Club VIP, were arrested last week. The ring arranged connections between wealthy men and more than 50 prostitutes in New York, Washington, Los Angeles, Miami, London and Paris, prosecutors said.

According to the law enforcement official, Spitzer is the person identified in legal papers as "Client 9," who paid to bring the prostitute named "Kristen" from New York to Washington for a four-hour tryst at a hotel on Feb. 13.

The court papers gave this account of the encounter: A defendant, Temeka Rachelle Lewis, confirmed that Client 9 would be "paying for everything - train tickets, cab fare from the hotel and back, mini bar or room service, travel time, and hotel."

The client paid $4,300 in cash to the service, with some being used for the encounter and the rest apparently to be used for credit. When discussing how the payments would be arranged, Client 9 told Lewis: "Yup, same as in the past, no question about it," suggesting it was a routine exchange.

The prostitute, who authorities described as a "petite, pretty brunette, 5-feet-5 inches, and 105 pounds," met the client in Room 871 at about 10 p.m.

In a conversation with the booking agent, Kristen said that she liked the client and that she did not think he was difficult.

The agent said she had been told the client "would ask you to do things that ... you might not think were safe ... very basic things," according to the papers, but that Kristen responded by saying, "I have a way of dealing with that ... I'd be, like, listen dude, you really want the sex?"

Spitzer has not been charged, and prosecutors did not comment on the case. The four defendants charged in the case last week were charged with violating the federal Mann Act, a 1910 law that outlaws traveling across state lines for prostitution.

The scandal was first reported on The New York Times' Web site.

Spitzer spoke about an hour and a half later. Stunned lawmakers gathered around televisions at the state Capitol in Albany to watch, and a media mob gathered outside the office of Democratic Lt. Gov. David Paterson, who would become governor if Spitzer were to resign. It took opponents only minutes to call for his resignation.

"Today's news that Eliot Spitzer was likely involved with a prostitution ring and his refusal to deny it leads to one inescapable conclusion: He has disgraced his office and the entire state of New York," said Assembly Republican leader James Tedisco. "He should resign his office immediately."

Spitzer, 48, built his political reputation on rooting out corruption, including several headline-making battles with Wall Street while serving as attorney general. He stormed into the governor's office in 2006 with a historic share of the vote, vowing to continue his no-nonsense approach to fixing one of the nation's worst governments.

Time magazine had named him "Crusader of the Year" when he was attorney general and the tabloids proclaimed him "Eliot Ness."

But his term as governor has been marred by problems, including an unpopular plan to grant driver's licenses to illegal immigrants and a plot by his aides to smear Spitzer's main Republican nemesis.

Spitzer had been expected to testify to the state Public Integrity Commission he had created to answer for his role in the scandal, in which his aides were accused of misusing state police to compile travel records to embarrass Senate Republican leader Joseph Bruno.

Bruno wouldn't comment when asked what Spitzer should do.

"I feel very badly for the governor's wife, for his children," Bruno said. "The important thing for the people of New York state is that people in office do the right thing."

Spitzer, who has three teenage daughters, had served two terms as attorney general where he pursued criminal and civil cases and cracked down on misconduct and conflicts of interests on Wall Street and in corporate America. He had previously been a prosecutor in the Manhattan District Attorney's Office, handling organized crime and white-collar crime cases.

His cases as state attorney general included a few criminal prosecutions of prostitution rings and into tourism involving prostitutes.

In 2004, he was part of an investigation of an escort service in New York City that resulted in the arrest of 18 people on charges of promoting prostitution and related charges.

minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2008/03/10/spitzer_prostitution/

********************************************************

March 11, 2008

New York Governor ‘Destroyed’ Over Threat To Probe 9/11 Attacks On US

By: Sorcha Faal, and as reported to her Western Subscribers (Traducción al Español abajo)

Reports consuming the US propaganda media organs and political elite today are centering upon the charges leveled against the Governor of New York, Eliot Spitzer[pictured top left], and who is said to have paid for the services of a high priced prostitute.

FSB reports circulating in the Kremlin today, however, point to a much more sinister effort behind the toppling of Governor Spitzer as he had just begun a new probe into Larry Silverstein, the owner of the World Trade Center brought down in the September 11, 2001 attacks upon the US, and the Bush Families Carlyle Group.

The focus of Governor Spitzer’s investigation, these reports state, revolve around the growing crisis embroiling the Carlyle Group as it nears total collapse and is facing insolvency due to Larry Silverstone’s withdrawal of over $14 billion from the embattled groups coffers, and which could see the loss to New York States already troubled massive pension fund of over $10 billion.

Governor Spitzer has long battled with the former comptroller for New York States Pension Fund, Alan G. Hevesi, who holds duel Israeli-American citizenship, and prompted a US Federal Probe that charged Comptroller Hevesi of using the over $100 billion of funds entrusted to him for the personal benefit of his friends and family, and to which Mr. Hevesi pled guilty for and paid a $5,000 fine.

Prior to his taking office as New York States Governor, these reports continue, Mr. Spitzer, as a prosecutor, had long targeted the United States Banking System for their vast theft of money from the American people, and had won billions in judgments against Bear Stearns, Credit Suisse First Boston, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan Chase, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, Salomon Smith Barney and UBS Warburg.

It is more than interesting to note, too, that these are the exact same International Banking Giants who are now reeling under the Global assault against them, with Bear Stearns becoming the latest victim, and as we can read as reported by Britain’s Independent News Service:

"Panic swept the credit markets on reports of an insolvency crunch at both the US investment bank Bear Stearns and the mortgage giant Fannie Mae, triggering a dramatic surge in default insurance and rumours of yet another emergency rate cut by the US Federal Reserve."

As Governor Spitzer becomes yet another victim to vast power of the West’s war, political and media elite assault against him, and by their introduction of sex charges against him, as they have done to so many of their adversaries in order to destroy their credibility, the truest warnings of these events to the American people will no doubt be lost, again.

And, with the most dangerous of these warnings coming from the World’s richest man, Warren Buffet, and as we can read as reported by the Market Watch News Service in their article titled "Buffett and Gross warn: $516 trillion bubble is a disaster waiting to happen", and which says:

"In short, despite Buffett's clear warnings, a massive new derivatives bubble is driving the domestic and global economies, a bubble that continues growing today parallel with the subprime-credit meltdown triggering a bear-recession.

Data on the five-fold growth of derivatives to $516 trillion in five years comes from the most recent survey by the Bank of International Settlements, the world's clearinghouse for central banks in Basel, Switzerland. The BIS is like the cashier's window at a racetrack or casino, where you'd place a bet or cash in chips, except on a massive scale: BIS is where the U.S. settles trade imbalances with Saudi Arabia for all that oil we guzzle and gives China IOUs for the tainted drugs and lead-based toys we buy."

There used to be a time when warnings were prudent to be given to the American people so  that they could, in some small measure, protect themselves, but, and sadly, those times are now gone as these people have nearly completed their descent into the abyss of total slavery to their masters with virtually no knowledge of the horrific future that lies before them. 

© March 11, 2008 EU and US all rights reserved.

[Ed. Note: The United States government actively seeks to find, and silence, any and all opinions about the United States except those coming from authorized government and/or affiliated sources, of which we are not one.  No interviews are granted and very little personal information is given about our contributors, or their sources, to protect their safety.]

Translation to Spanish by: Sister Maru Barraza, Mazatlán, Mexico

www.whatdoesitmean.com/index1077.htm